UC energy savings could eclipse $30M

By Dennis Carter, Assistant Editor

December 14th, 2009

Replacing old servers will help UC San Diego achieve carbon neutrality by 2014.

The University of California San Diego campus expects to save $36 million in annual utility costs after a series of green initiatives that include replacing 500 energy-intensive computer servers with 270 servers that require about half the electricity.

The server replacement will save the university $680,000 by slashing energy consumption by 7.9 million kilowatt-hours per year, according to projections released by the 1,200-acre campus, home to more than 27,000 students.

UC San Diego’s $74 million energy-saving initiative is part of a larger University of California program designed to cut greenhouse gases on all of its campuses, especially in older buildings that are the least energy efficient.

While California higher education has seen operating budgets cut to the bone in the past year, UC San Diego won’t have to allocate any money toward the effort.

San Diego Gas & Electric gave $14 million used in the green program, and the rest was funded with $59 million in low-interest revenue bonds that the university will pay for with the massive energy cost savings.

John Dilliot, the campus’s energy and utilities manager, said the energy-reduction program was first introduced in 2003, when California’s university system joined statewide utilities in formulating cost-cutting measures that would save schools tens of millions annually.

Energy savings, Dilliot said, are not only found in the replacement of outdated technology. The green initiative also will focus on everyday tasks that add up to huge utility costs by year’s end. UC San Diego has replaced more than 100,000 light bulbs in the past two years, he said.

And the school will soon have only low- and zero-emission vehicles in its 800-vehicle fleet. The large-scale program includes the use of 7.8 megawatts of renewable energy within the next few years and a goal to achieve carbon neutrality by 2025.

He said the green program will aim to cut down energy used by the university’s research equipment, such as freezers that run at -80 degrees and give off “large volumes of heat.”

Dilliott said UC San Diego has installed server virtualization software–which hosts university computing on off-campus servers–but the school remains hesitant to replace its very highest-powered servers with cloud computing.